CAPPED HOCK. 313 



the inner one becoming, sympathetically perhaps, affected. M. 

 Rigot, however, doubts this. He imagines the tendinous cap is 

 too closely bound down to admit of any accumulation of fluid*. 



The Cause of Capped Hock is, in two words, external injury. 

 The horse's hind legs are used as weapons of attack and defence, 

 as well as instruments of progression. When not fatigued by la- 

 bour during the day, he will on occasions, particularly if he be 

 viciously or playfully inclined, pass part of the night in kicking 

 against the heel-post or partition of his stall, and in doing so 

 can hardly fail to strike and bruise so prominent and vulnerable a 

 part as the cap of his hock. Kicking in harness against the splinter- 

 bar is likely to be attended by the same consequences. A horse 

 may bruise his hocks by slipping down upon his haunches. Even 

 lying down upon rough stone pavement without litter has been 

 known to produce contusion of the caps. In fact, a contusion or 

 wound of any sort will have the effect. We need, therefore, not 

 express any surprise at encountering so many capped hocks in our 

 daily perambulations. 



In answer to some inquiries I made, Mr. Braby, Veterinary 

 Surgeon to Messrs. Barclay and Perkins' Establishment, whose 

 accuracy of observation and experience enables me to write confi- 

 dently on the point, informs me, that the spreaders, dangling 

 about cart-horses' hind limbs, being too high placed to strike- the 

 hock, are apt to produce (not capped hock, but) a thickening of the 

 skin, with, sometimes, abrasion, of the part of the thigh immediately 

 above the point of the hock ; and he adds the instructive fact, that 

 the hock of the cart-horse is nothing like so obnoxious to disease in 

 general as that of the light horse. The cart-horse's hock ailments 

 principally arise from his being thrown upon his haunches in the 

 act of backing loads : this often occasions contusion of the cap of 

 the hock (as well as of other parts), which is followed by more or 

 less inflammation ; and the usual result of this is, thickening of the 

 integuments around the point of the hock, rendered permanent by 

 subsequent induration and callosity of the parts. 



* Les moyens d'affirmissemens sont si puissants, et en si grande nombre, 

 que je doute fort qu'il puisse jamais presenter ce genre d'alteration. — Anaic 

 mie des Animaux Domestiqves. 



VOL. IV. S s 



